Dark matter, invisible material whose presence is known mainly based on its gravitational effects at a galactic scale, would be a small but crucial ingredient in dark stars. Based on the Webb data, these objects could be either early galaxies or dark stars, Freese said. Conditions in the early universe may have been conducive to formation of dark stars, with high dark matter densities at the locations of star-forming clouds of hydrogen and helium. Freese and two colleagues first proposed the existence of dark stars in 2008, basing the name on the 1960s Grateful Dead song "Dark Star." And then you can learn about the properties of dark matter particles by studying a variety of dark stars of different masses."

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Persons: James Webb, Webb, Katherine Freese, Freese, Cosmin Ilie, Will Dunham, Rosalba O'Brien Organizations: University of Texas, Austin, National Academy of Sciences, Colgate University, Thomson